CLEVELAND, Ohio – The Kyrie Irving era got off to an inauspicious start Monday at The Q.

But to pin the Cavaliers' 104-96 loss to the Toronto Raptors on a 19-year-old rookie point guard is roundly unfair, not to mention misleading. Especially on a night the club's collective effort was bad enough to give it a running start on the No. 1 pick next season.

The Cavaliers defended poorly, shot worse and needed a strong effort from their second unit just to keep them in the game against one of the NBA's bottom feeders.

Irving, the top selection in the June draft, managed just six points on 2-of-12 shooting and never found his rhythm before a sellout crowd of 20,562 fans. He spent a good portion of the second half on the bench as backup Ramon Sessions helped the Cavaliers stay close with a team-high 18 points and six assists.

"It's disappointing," said Irving, who played 26 minutes. "You want to play really well when the whole world is watching. It's a learning process."

The point is an unforgiving position for first-year players. Not only did Irving struggle at the offensive end, but he had difficulty keeping the Raptors' Jose Calderon (15 points, 11 assists) in front of him.

How have other recent high-profile point guards fared in their NBA debuts? According to Stats LLC, Washington's John Wall had 14 points, Chicago's Derrick Rose scored 11 points and New Orleans' Chris Paul collected 13 points.

"He looked OK for what was like his fifth game in a year," said coach Byron Scott, who named Irving his starter on Monday morning. "He had seven assists and one turnover. The only thing he didn't do was shoot the ball well."

While the team won't admit it, this rebuilding season is about developing youngsters like Irving and Tristan Thompson, who had an impressive debut with 12 points and five rebounds.

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Scott subbed Irving for Sessions with 5:28 remaining and the Cavs trailing by eight points. The coach considered sticking with the more-effective player, but gave the kid a chance to play with the game on the line.

"I thought it would be good for the rookie to be out there at that time," Scott said. "I've got to learn about him just like I got to learn about other guys on the team. I know what Sess can do. He did a great job."

That's not a sentence that fit many Cavaliers, particularly the starters. Small forward Omri Casspi was 0-of-4 with two points and one rebound in 20-plus minutes. Power forward Antawn Jamison scored 15 points, while shooting 6-of-20 from the field.

The Cavs were 41.2 percent from the floor.

Other than Sessions, Anderson Varejao (15 points, 10 rebounds) and Alonzo Gee (15 points) were the home team's best players. They can't be the offensive leaders if the franchise plans to make a run at respectability.

The biggest problem, however, was a familiar one. The Cavaliers were shredded on defense, allowing the Raptors to shoot 53.2 percent, including 9-of-21 from behind the 3-point arc. Scott spent an entire season bemoaning the Cavs' lack or trust and communication on defense. They were the culprits again on opening night.

"That is the biggest thing to me," said Scott, who made defending a priority in training camp. "We have to get better on the defensive end. That's the bottom line."

The Raptors placed seven players in double figures, led by 15 from Calderon and DeMar DeRozan. Toronto used a 15-2 run early in the second quarter to build a nine-point lead. The Cavs cut the deficit to two points early in the fourth quarter, but that's as close as they would come.

The team's best defense of the night might have come after the game in the locker room as they rallied around their rookie point guard.

"I told Young Fella, you've just got to be patient," Sessions said. "You've got 65 more [games]. At the end of the game I showed him his assist-to-turnover ratio. The shot is gonna come. But that's the stat you want when you run the team. He ran the team. Seven assists and one turnover? You'd take that any day of the week."

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